


An Alternative Ending to the Alex Rider TV series

by DaniWib



Category: Alex Rider (TV 2020), Alex Rider - Anthony Horowitz
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Interrogation, Point Blanc, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Torture, paternal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2020-10-16
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:55:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 12,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26926951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaniWib/pseuds/DaniWib
Summary: Loved Season 1 of the TV series! But just wasn't happy with certain points.1.	Alex is kidnapped and interrogated by K-team and is great at not giving them the answers they want. Later, the captive students tell him how they’ve been interrogated by the clones, and torture is implied. Alex never saw his own clone at Point Blanc, yet the clone was able to impersonate him well enough to fool Jack and everyone at school, including Tom. How could he do this without interrogating Alex?2.	Alex demands that he go with the team back into Point Blanc, stating that he knows which are clones and which are students – only to be immediately tricked by the Kyra clone once inside? That never made sense to me. The whole scene with him and Stellenbosch in the lab seemed pointless. Alex doesn’t achieve anything by going there, and two agents have to be called away from the mission to try and rescue him. What was the point?I love comments! If you enjoy my story please let me know!
Relationships: Alex Rider & Everyone, Alex Rider & Jack Starbright, Alex Rider & James Sprintz, Alex Rider & Wolf, Jack Starbright/Wolf, K-Unit & Alex Rider, Tom Harris & Alex Rider, Tulip Jones & Alex Rider, Yassen Gregorovich & Alex Rider
Comments: 20
Kudos: 68





	1. Storming Point Blanc

**Author's Note:**

> We take up from the TV series when Alex and the team are inside Point Blanc. Fox and Snake are shooting at the guards down the stairs when Snake calls Wolf for support. He tells Alex to stay where he is and wait for his signal, then races off to join the others.

Alex Rider is peering around the corner watching the K-team battle the guards, when he sees movement from the other end of the hallway he is in. It’s Kyra, being frogmarched past by a guard. She’s been caught! Without even thinking about it Alex races off down the hallway, following them downstairs to the basement. The pair enter the lab and Alex slips through the door after them, when something slams into his head from behind and he crashes to the floor, stunned. Rolling over, he sees Stellenbosch holding a fire extinguisher over him and glaring at him.  
“Thank you Kyra” she says, allowing the Kyra clone out through the door and locking it closed after her with a heavy metal bar. 

Alex scoots away from Stellenbosch on his back on the floor, as she kicks him in the side. He thumps into something behind him, and feels himself being lifted up by his backpack straps. It’s the guard! Thinking quickly despite being shaken around roughly, Alex unclips the chest harness and shrugs out of the bag, diving to the side into the lab proper. The guard throws the bag aside where it lands across the back of a chair, the bodycam pointing into the room as Mrs Jones watches from base camp. 

Upstairs, the squad has dispatched the guards and is looking for Alex.  
“Eyes on Alex?” Wolf queries Mrs Jones.  
“Kyra was caught, Alex went after her, he's in the basement.” She replied. “Hurry, Stellenbosch and a guard are there. Remember, we need Greif alive.”  
Wolf and Snake head for the basement while Fox goes to take care of Greif.

Wolf and Snake arrive downstairs to see Alex and the guard facing off inside the lab. They try the heavy metal door but can’t get through, so attempt to break the viewing panels along the hallway instead. The guard advances and Alex punches him in the nose, but the guard just grins and punches Alex back. Shoving Alex ahead of him into a cabinet and smashing bottles of flammable chemicals to onto the ground, the guard slams Alex’s head against it, who slumps, half conscious. 

“Get him on the table!” yells Stellenbosch from the other side of it. Following orders, the guard lifts Alex and slams him down onto the operating table, and starts strapping down his arms and legs. Stellenbosch does the same on the other side. Alex comes to as Stellenbosch reaches for the strap on his left leg. He struggles fiercely and manages to kick her in the head as hard as he can. She reels backwards but then recovers, grabbing a pair of operating scissors and stabbing him deeply above the knee.  
“Arrghh!” Alex screams in pain and collapses down, ceasing to struggle against the straps that now tie him fully to the table. Outside, Wolf and Snake continue to try and get into the room, unaware that the windows were specially reinforced to stop asylum inmates from escaping.  
“Go and help Dr Greif.” Stellenbosch tells the guard, gesturing to the other end of the room. “I can take care of this brat from here.”

While she is distracted, Alex has slipped his right hand into his pocket and removed the pocket knife he put there last night at base camp. He opens the blade and starts cutting away at the strap around his wrist. It’s tricky using only one hand but he’s determined not to stop. It’s on the other side from Stellenbosch and he hopes she doesn’t notice what he’s doing.  
Then he sees something around her neck. Whispering quietly, he tricks her into leaning down over him to hear better, then slams his head upwards, head butting her in the nose. Once again she reels back away from him, this time with blood coursing down her face. 

Alex keeps cutting away at the straps and looks over to where he can hear Wolf trying to get in. He can feel that he’s almost through and looks back to Stellenbosch, only to see that she’s coming towards him holding a syringe in her hand and smiling evilly at him. 

“Nice try Alex, but now it’s time for you to die. Your friends can’t get in here and no-one can help you. You're all alone.” In desperation, Alex wrenches his arm upwards and it comes free, just in time to grab Stellenbosch’s wrist as she leans over him with the syringe.  
“Oh you annoying little CHILD!!!” she screams at him. “Just stop fighting me for once!”  
Alex has no intention of not fighting her, knowing that he’s in the fight of his life. He concentrates all his strength on the arm holding the syringe away from him, only to see her other hand descend to cover his mouth and nose, cutting off his breathing.  
“Enough of this!” she screams into his face, pressing his head into the table with all her strength, stopping him from getting any breath. Alex keeps struggling against her but he knows his time is running out. 

Wolf goes berserk outside, shouting at Snake to get down as he starts shooting at the windows in desperation. They still don’t break and he looks back in as Alex passes out from lack of air, his head and arm falling to the side and his eyes closing.  
The pocket knife is knocked to the floor, bouncing off the metal of the bed, causing sparks to fly and ignite the flammable chemicals covering the floor from the struggle earlier.  
Stellenbosch wastes no time, injecting the syringe into Alex’s neck and smiling in triumph at having finally beaten him. She looks over and notices the fire heading for the gas bottles and races around the table, heading for the exit that the guard took. 

The fire ignites the gas bottles, causing a huge explosion that knocks out the windows and doors and brings half the roof down. Wolf and Snake lie stunned as Mrs Jones watches in horror, seeing all three body cams go dark at the same time.  
“Alex? Alex!!” she cries, before grabbing a large med kit and racing out to the helicopter and back up team outside.  
“Standby” Snake radio’s, as she and Wolf stagger upright and step cautiously into the bomb site that was the lab. They search for and find Alex, huddled on his side under the twisted remains of the table, still partially strapped to it. He is unconscious, and Snake feels for a pulse as Wolf works to untangle him from the straps and the table.  
“We’ve got Cub. He’s out, but breathing.” she reports. Wolf scoops Alex up and cradles him in his arms, turning to head back upstairs away from the still burning lab. He races up the stairs holding Alex as if he weighs nothing at all, before placing him carefully down on the floor of the main room. 

Mrs Jones arrives as Wolf is compressing Alex’s chest and Snake is giving him mouth to mouth. “He stopped breathing and we lost his pulse.” Wolf reports tersely, concentrating on what he’s doing.  
Fox is guarding Greif and the clones in the next room and Eagle brings up the students from the laundry. Seeing Alex on the floor, Kyra and James rush over to him.  
“Do you know what Stellenbosch injected him with?” asks Mrs Jones, opening the med kit. “I’ve got anti-venom and anti-tox drugs but I need to know what she used. Kyra, do you have any idea what it might be?”  
Kyra shakes her head, looking worried. “They always knocked us out when they took us down there, I don’t know what they used.”  
Mrs Jones and Wolf look at each other and at the same time say “Morphine.”  
“A large enough dose will kill him.” Wolf says. “Hurry.”

Mrs Jones selects a syringe of adrenalin and slams it down on Alex’s chest, injecting it straight into his heart. Everyone pauses and holds their breath for a second, until Alex suddenly gasps and arches his back as the adrenalin surges through him. He opens his eyes and blurrily sees someone leaning over him holding a syringe, then cries out and knocks the hand away from him, thinking it’s Stellenbosch still. Wolf grabs his hand and calls his name, and Alex becomes more alert, realising that it was Mrs Jones and not Stellenbosch. He relaxes down again and breathes more evenly. Looking around, Alex sees Kyra and James and smiles weakly at seeing them safe. They grin back at him. 

As Alex lies there recovering, Mrs Jones and Wolf discuss the mission over him.  
“We’ve got all the clones and the students, and Greif as well. It seems like Greif managed to delete all the files before we got to him, but Smithers might be able to recover something.” Wolf reports.  
“Lets hope so.” She replies. “At least we’ve got all the students safe, and Greif alive.” She replies.  
“No!” Alex interrupts. “Not all the files!”  
“It’s alright Alex, we’ll work with what we have.” Mrs Jones says soothingly to him.  
“No, you don’t understand.” Alex says weakly, feeling the morphine start to take him away again. He rolls his head to the side and opens his left hand, which has been clenched closed all this time. Lying cradled inside is a USB on a broken lanyard. Everyone stares at it as Mrs Jones picks it up carefully.  
“What is it Alex?” she asks, but Alex has passed out again. Wolf quickly checks his pulse and says “It’s ok, it’s just the rest of the morphine. The adrenalin got his heart started again but it was probably a massive dose, he’ll have to sleep it off.”

The students meanwhile, are staring at the USB in Mrs Jones hand.  
“It’s Stellen-bitches back up!” James states. “She always wears it around her neck, it has everything on it, all the records, everything!”  
“Alex must have grabbed it when he head butted her.” Wolf tells Mrs Jones.  
“Alex head butted Stellen-bitch?! Awesome!” James cheers in admiration.  
“He never stopped fighting her, not once. Not until he couldn’t fight anymore.” Wolf replied, equally admiring, as they all looked down at Alex lying in front of them.  
“He’s one hell of a tough kid.”

Later. Point Blanc is eerily quiet. Everyone has left and the rooms are echoing and empty, until footsteps crunch through the debris of the lab. The feet step carefully over and around piles of rubbles and glass, then stop when they come to another set of feet. A moment later, both sets of feet start up from the basement, working their way out of Point Blanc.


	2. Back in London

In the offices of MI6, Mrs Jones is holding a final meeting with Blunt, Crawley and Smithers.  
They’ve reviewed the body cam footage from the Point Blanc mission and are re-watching Alex’s camera as he’s being tied to the operating table.  
“There, you see? She’s wearing the lanyard around her neck when he says something to her, then he head butts her and it’s gone. Clever boy, managing to grab it while he’s tied down like that.” Smithers shows them how Alex did it.  
“Remarkable, especially since he was using his other hand to cut through the straps at the same time. Smart of him, asking for the pocket knife. How is he?” asked Blunt.  
“Well from what he told us, he’d been strapped to that table at least twice before.” Mrs Jones told them. “I suppose he wanted to be prepared if it happened again. Alex slept all the way home and is with Doctor Andrews now being checked.” Mrs Jones tells them. “He’ll have a limp for a while, and he’s been very quiet, but I think he’ll be fine in time. I’m taking him home after this” she continued.  
“And the files?” he asked Smithers.  
“They are encrypted of course, with a level of sophistication I haven’t seen before. Alex did well to get them, I’ve not been able to get anything from Greif’s computer yet and probably won’t be able to. I’m working on the decryption but it will take some time.”  
Blunt nods and stands up. “Very well, let us know when you’ve got them. We’ll start on Greif tomorrow.”

Later that afternoon Mrs Jones drives Alex home and pulls up in front of his house.  
“Let me know if you need anything Alex, anything at all.” She calls, as he walks slowly inside. He looks back at her but doesn’t say anything before turning and walking towards Jack, who has opened the front door and is waiting for him. They embrace, and Tom pats Alex on the shoulder as they all go inside and close the door. 

Inside, Jack and Tom are watching Alex warily as he goes into his bedroom, not knowing what to say. Tom starts to show Alex the cards he brought over after school and tells him about the weekly Monday school assembly being cancelled for a fire alarm that day.  
“It was great, we all got to sit outside for ages while they sorted it out, we missed the whole afternoons classes!” Tom tells him, hoping to give Alex something amusing to think about, instead of whatever he’s just been through. Alex doesn’t say anything, just quietly shuts the door, leaving them in the hallway. Jack and Tom look at each other with worried eyes and go back downstairs, leaving Alex in peace. 

The next day Tom is surprised to see Alex arrive at school. “You alright mate? You didn’t have to come back yet.”  
Alex looked at him quietly, not knowing how to tell Tom that he’s being haunted by the image of Stellenbosch leaning over him with the syringe and smothering him. Being at school is better than being at home alone while Jack is at work, with nothing to do but think of what happened at Point Blanc. 

The day passes slowly, with Alex in a daze most of the time, staring off into space and not speaking much at all. Everyone assumes it’s because he’s still grieving his uncle and leaves him alone, just letting him be. Alex and Tom ride home from school together, with Tom giving him a quiet farewell as they part ways.  
“I’ll see you tomorrow then?” Tom asks. “Just call me if you need to you know, talk or anything.”  
“Thanks Tom.” Alex replies quietly, as he rides around the corner to go home. 

Jack is still at work when Alex arrives home, letting himself in. He turns the corner into the kitchen and stops in shock as he stares at – himself? Alex suddenly realises to his horror that it’s a clone of himself, but before he can do anything he feels a prick in his neck and everything goes dark.


	3. Taken, Day 1

Alex slowly regains consciousness and blinks groggily as he looks around an unfamiliar room with no windows. He is kneeling with his arms raised out on each side above him with his wrists cable-tied to a chain running across some beams on the ceiling above him. He twists his wrists and pulls but nothing happens, he’s bound too tightly. 

A shape moves in front of him and he jerks backwards as he sees the clone looking down at him. Alex doesn’t bother asking what he wants. He knows from what the other students at Point Blanc told him what comes next. Interrogation. The clone will want to take over Alex’s life and needs to know everything about him to do so. Drawing upon the lessons from the Tibetan monks and blessing his uncle for giving that to him, Alex breathes deeply through his nose while glaring at the clone, and calms himself, preparing to answer any questions with half-truths and lies. He can do this, he’s done it before when Wolf and the team took him, and again when Greif and Stellenbosch had him tied up on the lab table at Point Blanc.

“Alex.” A voice drawls off to his side. “How wonderful to see you again.” Alex looks over and pales in shock as Stellenbosch struts over to him. Her usually immaculate white outfit rumpled and her hair dishevelled, she draws on a cigarette below her swollen and bloodied nose, held together with a plaster. One of her eyes is blackened and she stares at him with glee. “We are going to have so much fun together, you and I.” she says menacingly as she steps around behind him. 

“I see you’ve noticed what you did to me last time we met. I am looking forward to returning the pleasure.” She purrs, as she presses her burning cigarette into his right shoulder blade. Alex jerks and grits his teeth against the pain, refusing to cry out in front of her. He smells his school jacket burning and then his flesh as she twists it into his skin. 

“Enough Eva.” The clone orders, sitting down in front of Alex. “It’s time to talk.” He looks at Alex in contemplation. “Are you going to make this easy or do we have to force you? You know what we want.”  
“Why would you want to be me?” Alex asks. “I’m nobody. I’m not rich, I don’t have influential parents. Being me won’t help you at all.”

“Ahh but it will. You see, whoever it was that destroyed Point Blanc now has my Father, my brothers and sisters. I want them back. You know who it was, you helped them, and sooner or later I’ll find out, and I’ll find a way to get them back. I don’t care if I have to be you for years, I’ll get them back one way or another. If I’m stuck wearing your face for the rest of my life, I’ll use it to get them back if it’s the last thing I do. We can start by you telling us who it was that took them.” 

The clone nods to Stellenbosch off to the side, who once again goes behind Alex. She jerks roughly on a cord that he suddenly realises is around his neck, and pulls it back, tightening a slipknot around his throat. He gasps as he suddenly can’t breathe, bringing back memories of being strapped to the table at Point Blanc.

Stellenbosch releases the cord. “Remember the fun we had Alex? I tried so hard to kill you then. I don’t know how you survived but I won’t let you get the better of me again. This cord is tied to your ankles. If you try to stand up, or kick me again, or escape, the slipknot will tighten and you’ll strangle yourself. Do be a good boy and stay still while I inject you, we wouldn’t want you to die just yet.”

Alex can’t help himself and struggles to lean away from her as she grabs his hair and pulls his head to the side, exposing the right side of his neck. Stellenbosch plunges the syringe she’s holding into his neck and injects him with something, probably a truth serum. He slumps and relaxes into it, allowing the drug to have its way. His uncle taught him not to fight a truth serum but to flow with it, to not lie under its influence but to twist the truth as much as possible, so nothing he said could be believed. 

“Alex.” A voice calling him. “Alex. Who destroyed Point Blanc? Who were you working with?”  
“I don’t know their names. They found me in the hospital after I escaped and took me back with them.” Voices mutter around him as he looks blearily around.  
“What did they want with you?”  
“They wanted me to show them the layout. They knew about Greif and his experiments. They wanted me to help them rescue the students.” The voices muttered again as he struggled to keep his eyes open. Everything he told them was the truth – it just wasn’t the whole truth.  
“So maybe it was just coincidence? Maybe he wasn’t part of it.”  
“It doesn’t matter. They’ll come for him sooner or later, only it will be me they get instead of him.”

“Alex. Alex, open your eyes.” Alex looked at the clone groggily. “Tell me about Jack. Who is she?”  
“She lives with me, looks after me.”  
“Are you close?”  
“Yes, we hang out together every night. She’s the best cook.” Alex struggled to think of what he could tell the clone that would give him away to Jack. “She cooks these great meals every night for me, she’s really good.”  
“What’s your favourite?”  
“Pepperoni pizza, with anchovies. Lots of anchovies.” Alex replied.  
“Tell us about school, and your friends. Tomorrow is Wednesday, what classes do you have then?”  
“Umm. I think I have English with Mr Tate, then umm science with Mrs Morningside. Math in the afternoon with a new teacher, I can’t remember his name.”

The questioning went on for what felt like a very long time. Alex tried hard to mix as much falsehood in with the truth he knew he was being forced to speak. He was desperately hoping that Jack or Tom, or the teachers at school who had completely different names from the ones he’d given, would notice that something was wrong and tell Mrs Jones. Finally, Stellenbosch pointed out that Jack would be wondering where Alex was and that the clone should go home, and Alex was left alone. He slumped in exhaustion, the cable ties cutting into his wrists, as he waited in hope of rescue.


	4. Taken, Day 2

Alex was awake this time and realised that there must be a stairwell in the wall behind him as the clone came down the stairs. He saw that the clone had taken his iPhone and was setting it up to film the interrogation from across the room. He assumed that yesterday’s talks had been filmed too, presumably so the clone could study Alex’s answers and manner of speaking. The clone was wearing Alex’s school uniform and it was bizarre looking at him, like looking into a mirror that moved separately to himself, the same and yet not.

“Think you’re clever, don’t you?” the clone asked him angrily, as he slapped Alex across the face. “Was anything you told me true? I made an idiot of myself asking Jack for anchovies on a pizza for dinner. She looked at me like I was crazy. And your teachers names! It’s lucky for me that I found your timetable in your bag and saw that you’d given me false names before I mucked up again.”  
The clone turned to Stellenbosch who was smoking again in the corner. “How could he do that? You said the drugs would make him tell us everything, but half of what he told us was lies – and I don’t know what was truth and what was lies!”

“I don’t know how he did it.” Stellenbosch replied, stalking around behind Alex and pressing her cigarette into his shoulder again. “I guess we’ll just have to do it the old fashioned way instead.” she smiled, as she burnt him again. “I’ve been hoping we’d have to.” Alex writhed away from the pain as his heart beat faster in fear, bracing himself for what was coming next. 

It had been a long day for him already. With the clone taking his place at home and school, Alex had been left alone with Stellenbosch, who was bored and holding a grudge against him. She had amused herself by burning his back repeatedly with her cigarette, and holding her hands over his nose and mouth several times until he passed out, just like at Point Blanc. She hadn’t bothered asking him any questions, content just to terrorise him for fun. Each time he regained consciousness, she was sitting and staring at him, smiling wickedly. Alex was starting to be completely terrified of her.

The clone sat back as Stellenbosch selected a knife from a table in front of them.   
“You do it, I don’t want to get blood on my uniform.” Stellenbosch didn’t reply, simply smiled and approached Alex with the knife.   
“Where shall we start?” she purred, sliding the knife down his face to his neck, digging it in just enough to draw blood. “I’d better stay away from anything important to begin with.” She slid the knife down the front of his shirt, slicing away the buttons one by one. 

“Tell me about Tom.” The clone ordered. When Alex didn’t answer right away, Stellenbosch sliced across his chest quickly, causing him to gasp in pain.   
“He’s a mate at school.” Alex answered.   
“He’s more than that though, isn’t he. Is he your best mate? He certainly didn’t leave me alone today, wittering on about movies all day.”

Stellenbosch cut Alex again before he had a chance to answer. She circled him, around to her favourite spot behind him where he can’t see what she’s going to do next, and sliced across his upper left arm, cutting through his uniform and into his skin.   
“Wait! Wait, I’ll answer, just give me a minute.” he gasped. He thought quickly and realised that giving false answers about Tom would only put him in danger. Tom wouldn’t be able to help Alex, he doesn’t even know about the clones, so he might as well tell them what they want to know. But he wasn’t going to give Stellenbosch the satisfaction of knowing that. 

Guessing what was coming next, Alex braced himself. Sure enough, Stellenbosch covered his mouth and nose with her hand again, but this time Alex managed to keep his mouth open as she did so. As soon as her hand was over his mouth, he bit down with all his strength, feeling her skin tear and blood fill his mouth. She screamed and pulled away but he hung on, glaring at the clone as he bit down harder, working his teeth through the fleshy part of her hand.   
Stellenbosch remembered that she was holding a knife and slashed at Alex, cutting him across his back and pulling her hand away from him as she staggered away. Alex smiled grimly, blood running down his chin, and spat a chunk of her hand onto the floor in front of the clone, who he noticed was smiling slightly. Stellenbosch was shrieking incoherently in the corner as she held her damaged hand against her chest.   
“Oh do go and sort yourself out.” The clone ordered her impatiently, giving her a rag and pushing her up the stairs. “I’ll take care of him.”

“You’ll pay for that, you know.” The clone muttered as he sat back down in front of Alex.   
“I already have.” Alex answered quietly, thinking of what he’d endured that day while alone with Stellenbosch.   
““Right, where were we. Are you going to answer my questions or do I have to cut you? I will you know. Just because I let the bitch do it doesn’t mean I won’t.”  
“You don’t like her either, do you?” Alex asked in wonder. “Why are you with her? How can you stand it?”  
“The woman is psychotic but she has her uses. She knew your name for starters, and she is obsessed with my Father. She will do anything to get him back, anything at all. I’ll keep her around until I don’t need her anymore, and then I’ll get rid of her if I need to. Perhaps she’ll become my legal guardian if I have to remove Jack. You know, if you tell me any more lies and Jack works it out, I’ll have to kill her. So I suggest you start telling the truth.”

Alex slumped in exhaustion and nodded. There followed a long session of questions about Jack again, and about Tom and school as well. This time he mostly told the truth, not wanting to endanger them anymore. Finally the clone seemed satisfied and started to leave. 

“Oh, one more thing. Who is Mrs Jones? She called me today and asked how I was.”  
Hope flared in Alex’s heart. Surely Mrs Jones would have realised it wasn’t him.   
“She worked with my Uncle at the bank. She checks on me now and then.” he answered.   
“Right. Well I told her I was fine and back at school and she seemed happy with that.” The clone said, and left.   
Throughout another long, lonely and pain-filled night, Alex clung to the hope that Mrs Jones would figure it out and come to his rescue. Aching, exhausted, hungry and dehydrated, Alex refused to give up.


	5. Taken, Day 3

Yet another day had passed, almost unbearably slowly and at the same time far too quickly. Stellenbosch had mostly left him alone, nursing her heavily bandaged hand and glaring at him in hatred. She had burnt him a few times but always took care to keep her distance, not trusting that he wouldn’t hurt her again. Alex’s wrists were bleeding as he’d tried desperately to twist free the few short times he’d been left alone, but he hadn’t been able to. He was feeling faint from hunger and thirst, and starting to be seriously worried about how long he’d been held here. 

A door slammed somewhere upstairs and loud, stomping footsteps approached. Alex watched warily as the clone burst down the stairs into the room, wearing his school uniform again, but carrying a cricket bat this time. He angrily put the iPhone into video mode again before storming over towards Alex. Something was different with the clone today and Alex, with a sinking feeling in his guts, knew he was about to find out what. 

Stellenbosch was watching the angry clone as well when without warning he belted Alex across the ribs with the bat. Gasping in shock and pain, Alex had no time to recover before the clone belted him again, and again, and again. He heard cracking sounds and realised his ribs were breaking, then felt a blow across his head that almost knocked him out, making his ears ring and his head spin.  
“Not his head!” Stellenbosch yelled. “We still need him!”  
The clone changed the angle of his next blow and smashed the bat down across Alex’s right fore-arm instead of his head, causing yet another sickening crack as Alex screamed in pain.  
“What is it?” Stellenbosch demanded. “What’s happened?”

“That Mrs Jones does NOT work for a bank!” the clone yelled, as he clouted Alex in the guts with the bat. “She came to see me today, to ask me what else I knew about Point Blanc. When I asked her why, she told me that Greif has been killed! He’s dead, my Father is dead, and this pathetic, insignificant, stupid little boy knew who they were all along!”  
With each sentence he belted Alex in a new place with the bat, his stomach, ribs, legs and arms all being struck over and over again. There was nothing Alex could do but gasp and endure the pain, struggling to stay conscious as waves of agony washed over and over him. 

The clone threw the bat aside and closed his hands around Alex’s throat, beginning to strangle him. “I am going to kill him!”  
“Stop!” Stellenbosch shouted, stepping in and shoving the clone off Alex. “Wait! You promised me that I’d kill him, he’s mine!”  
The clone paused and loosened his grip, allowing Alex to gasp and suck in air, then stepped back. “Fine, you can have him, but not just yet. I’ve thought of something better.” It was scary how quickly he switched from homicidal rage to cool, calm and collected.

Alex hung helplessly from his restraints, unable to even support himself on his abused knees anymore. His head was spinning and everything, every part of him, hurt in ways he couldn’t even describe. The clone gripped Alex’s chin, forcing him to look up but his eyes wouldn’t even focus properly. Alex could still hear the terrible words that came from his clone’s mouth next though. 

“The school dance is tonight. I wasn’t going to go, but now I think I will. Tom wants me to go, the idiotic fool. What I want is to kill him. And then I’ll kill Ayisha, and then I’ll kill Jack. And then you’ll know what it feels like, to have your family taken from you.” 

Alex stared in despair at the clone, not even able to protest. He was dazed and in more pain than he’d ever felt in his life and had no idea what he could do.

“You come and film it,” the clone ordered Stellenbosch, “then you can come back here and show him before you finish him off. Make him suffer.” he said cruelly. “Make sure you show him exactly how we kill all his friends, and how much it hurt them. Make him pay.” Wiping Alex’s blood off his hands, the clone picked up the bat and smacked it across Alex’s temple, knocking him out. He then brought the camera in for a close up of Alex, slumped unconscious, hanging limply from his wrists and bleeding before closing the app and leaving with Stellenbosch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot to include the scene where Yassen murders Dr Grief but it would have been exactly as per the show so please just pretend it's there!


	6. The Dance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I cheated a little here and inserted scenes directly from the show. I didn't want to rewrite their work exactly so just wrote ***insert scene such and such  
> It's a bit jarring but I'm hoping fans will understand!

Sometime later Alex awoke. He’d realised at last that he simply couldn’t wait for rescue anymore. Tom and his friends were in deadly danger and no-one knew about the clone, or that Stellenbosch had survived. It was up to Alex, he would have to do something, anything. Looking up again at the cable ties and the chain, he thought perhaps the blood on his wrists might help him slip through one of them. It would have to be his left hand, he was pretty sure his right arm was broken and he couldn’t bear to pull on it at all. Taking a few deep breaths, he braced himself and started pulling his left arm down, twisting his wrist as he pulled. It hurt, unbelievably hurt, but he felt something give a little. Pausing for a breath, he looked up, and saw that he’d only succeeded in cutting himself more. Alex took another breath and began again, determined to free himself and save his friends. 

*** Insert scene from the TV show where clone Alex finds Tom at the dance and asks him for a word. Continue scene until the part where the clone has beaten Tom on the floor of the library.

“You’re his best friend and even you can’t tell the difference, can you?” clone Alex sneers at Tom. Tom, who has no idea what he’s talking about, says “What?” in confusion. Clone Alex pulls out his iPhone and shows Tom the video of him beating Alex with the bat, shoving it into Tom’s face. “There’s your so called best friend! I’ve had him tied up for days and days and you never even noticed that it was me and not him with you. You had no idea!” Tom stares at the image of Alex hanging from his wrists, beaten and unconscious, in shock.  
“Who are you?” he asks in dismay, scared for himself and for his friend as well, not knowing what is going on, just that something is very, very badly wrong. 

*** Insert scene from the TV show where Smithers and Crawley realise that there’s a clone of Alex as well, and MI6 get moving to find him (this time it’s the files from the USB that Alex recovered from Stellenbosch rather than the computer ones that are finally decrypted)

Alex bursts through the library doors to find the clone looming over Tom. Tom is in bad shape but Alex looks worse, his hands, wrists and face covered in blood and his school jacket and shirt ripped and grimy. Wide strips of gaffer tape have been taped messily around his right forearm and his left hand for some reason.  
“Stop!” Alex yells at his clone, panting. “You don’t have to do this!”  
“Stop?” the clone replies, “I’m not going to stop until he’s dead, and Ayisha is dead, and everyone else you care about is dead”. Tom stares in confusion at the two Alex’s, not understanding what is happening.  
Alex continues talking to the clone, stepping backwards to draw him away from Tom, whom he yells at to run as soon as they are far enough away from him. The two fight until the clone knocks Alex to the ground and runs off chasing Tom. 

*** Insert scene from the TV show inside the dance, continue until the two Alex’s and Tom are outside the school and Tom has knocked the clone to the ground. 

Jack arrives after the MI6 agents and is restrained by Crawley from running to Alex, who is hugging Tom as the clone is grabbed by the agents.  
“Are you sure we have the right one?” Crawley askes Mrs Jones.  
“I don’t know.” she replies, concerned.  
Suddenly the clone grabs one of the agents guns and aims it at Tom. Knowing that the real Alex would never point a gun at a friend, Mrs Jones takes aim and fires at the clone, but not before he has also fired.  
Alex desperately pushes Tom out of the way, knocking him to the ground and is hit three times by the clone’s bullets instead, in the hip, chest and shoulder, spinning him around to land face down on the ground next to Tom. The clone, shot by Mrs Jones, also drops to the ground. Tom stares, horrified, at Alex lying in front of him, unconscious and covered in blood. 

Screaming Alex’s name, Jack and Mrs Jones run over to him and turn him over onto his back, crying out with dismay at the blood pooling out from under him and from his many injuries.  
“Get pressure on those wounds!” Mrs Jones yells at Tom and Jack, pulling out her phone to call the paramedics. Jack covers the chest and hip wound while on the other side of Alex, Tom covers his shoulder wound with his good arm, putting pressure on the horrible bullet holes to help stop the bleeding.  
Alex, barely conscious, struggles to breathe and to keep his eyes open. He looks up at Jack and Tom and smiles an oddly beautiful smile, before passing out under their hands. 

Calling his name, Mrs Jones checks his pulse and pats his cheeks to bring him around, imploring Alex to stay awake as he opens his eyes again. There’s nowhere on his face or chest that isn’t covered in blood and she doesn’t want to hurt him any more but she won’t let him pass out again. Jack and Tom are both crying as they continue to apply pressure and tell Alex that he’ll be alright, just stay with them. As the agents get the clone into a car, the paramedics arrive. 

Tom, Jack and Mrs Jones step back once the paramedics take over and let them do their work, Tom cradling his broken arm. Jack’s hands are shaking as she wrings them together, covered in Alex’s blood, and Tom looks down at his own hand to see it is also dripping with his best friend’s life blood.  
“Tom, how did you know which one was Alex?” Mrs Jones asks.  
“What? Oh. His wrists.” Tom replies, pointing at Alex’s bloody and shredded wrists. “That one (indicating the clone) showed me a video of Alex all tied up. He was beating him with a bat. He said he had Alex for days and days and we didn’t even know! How could we know? We didn’t even know there was a clone of Alex, did you?”  
Tom and Jack both look at Mrs Jones, who doesn’t answer them.  
“Crawley! Phone!” she calls, pointing at the clone. Crawley searches him and finds Alex’s iPhone and takes it. 

Suddenly there is a monotonous beeping sound as the portable ECG that the paramedics have attached to Alex flat lines. The three look over in anguish to see that Alex has stopped breathing. The paramedics start muttering at each other and moving very fast, getting the defibrillator out and applying it to his chest. One applies air using a bag mask while the other gets ready to shock Alex’s heart.  
“Clear!” he shouts, then applies the pads to Alex’s chest, which lurches up then down again. The flat lines lurches also but go flat again.  
“Charging to 200, clear!” shouts the paramedic and applies the pads again. Alex lurches again but lies unresponsive on the ground.  
“One last time, come on kid, come back to us! Clear!” shouts the paramedic and this time Alex’s heart starts beating again. He takes a painful breath and coughs up blood, opening his eyes and searching for his friends. The paramedics get Alex onto a stretcher and head for the ambulance as Jack and Tom follow. Mrs Jones gives them instructions to go to a private hospital and says that Dr Andrews will meet them there. 

Mrs Jones heads back to the office with Crawley to report to Blunt. On the way she calls Dr Andrews and tells him to get to the hospital for Alex, then calls Wolf and asks him to bring the team into the office as well. 

\------------------------------------------

Blunt, Mrs Jones, Crawley, and Smithers, along with Wolf and his team are all sitting around the conference table at MI6, trying to work out what happened to Alex. Mrs Jones gives his iPhone to Smithers and tells him to hook it up to the screens in front of them and they see videos appear in the photo stream. They look at each other grimly as Smithers selects the first one, and their horror only increases as they realise that Stellenbosch didn’t die at Point Blanc as they had assumed, that she not only survived but found her way to Alex’s home, with the clone of him, and was able to take him from under their noses. 

Several hours later, they have finished the videos of Alex being tortured and are staring silently at the final image of him, beaten unconscious and hanging limply from his wrists. Every person in the room is disturbed and upset, all adults with years of experience dealing with the very worst aspects of human cruelty, but what they’d just seen inflicted on their young friend had shaken them to the very core of their humanity. And somehow, sometime, Alex had changed from being an asset, a useful tool, to a friend, especially for Wolf and Mrs Jones, who look particularly horrified and shaken. Snake and Eagle glanced over at Wolf, who, while watching the awful scenes in the videos, had taken a piece of paper and methodically twisted it around and around, forming it into a rope like noose and gripping it as if he’d like to wrap it around Stellenbosch’s neck. 

“Three days.” Blunt says. “They had him for three days and we never even knew! Why didn’t anyone realise sooner that there was a clone of Alex as well? And how did we not know that Stellenbosch was still alive?”  
“He got that bitch a good one when he bit her.” Fox said in admiration, as the others nodded in agreement.  
“It just never occurred to us that he’d been there long enough for that.” Mrs Jones said. “We’ve let him down so badly. He’ll never trust us again after this.”  
“He never gave us away though, did he. Never once told them who we are. He’ll make a fine agent some day.” Crawley commented.  
“If he even survives.” states Smithers. “He was shot as well you said, 3 times? On top of all of that?” indicating the screen and shaking his head. “It’s not looking good for him.”

Mrs Jones’s phone rings and she puts it on speaker. “Dr Andrews, how is Alex?”  
“I don’t know what you people have been doing to that poor child but I have never seen anyone so badly treated in my entire career. I’ve treated your agents for you in the past but this is beyond the pale, this is abuse. I have a good mind to report you all for this!” Dr Andrews shouts into the phone.  
“It wasn’t us Andrews and you know it.” Blunt snarls back. “He was taken by enemy operatives and has been tied up and tortured for days, then tonight he was shot. Stop your posturing and tell us how he is!”

“He’s stable, for now. He flat lined again in the ambulance on the way here, and again on the operating table. We got him back each time and he’s a fighter, but his entire body is bruised and bloody and he’s completely dehydrated. We couldn’t even find a vein in his arms for a central line, between the blood loss and dehydration, we had to use his neck instead. His right lung collapsed during surgery from the bullet wound and he has massive internal bleeding, from both the lower bullet and what appears to be a great deal of blunt force trauma. He has ligature marks on his neck, repeated marks from more than one strangulation attempt, as well as marks from being throttled at least once.” 

The doctor continued “He has 8 broken ribs on his left side, and 7 on his right, both bones in his right forearm are broken and he has both a cracked cheek bone and skull. We won’t know until he wakes up whether he has damage to the brain or not, and I want to keep him sedated until his heart has had time to recover from the three times we’ve had to shock it back. I honestly don’t know how he has survived all this. He’s damned lucky you got to him when you did, and he’s going to be in a lot of pain for a long time while he recovers.”

“We didn’t Dr Andrews,” Mrs Jones says sadly. “We don’t know how, but Alex managed to free himself, escape and get to the school to save his friend, despite his injuries.”  
“Ah. He freed himself? Clever lad. Actually I might be able to explain that. Tied up, you said? With what, do you know?” Dr Andrews replied.  
“They used cable ties to tie him onto a chain.” Wolf answered in his deep, gruff voice. 

“Right. Well, that explains the state of his left hand. Someone, I’m assuming Alex himself since you say he got free on his own, has pulled so hard on his hand against something that he’s very nearly severed his thumb from the base. He’s dislocated it, ripped the tendons and nerves apart and come very close to cutting the whole thumb off. I can’t even imagine what he must have been thinking to do such damage to himself, the will power needed to keep going despite the pain would have been incredible”.  
“Sounds just like Alex.” Wolf mutters in sad admiration as the others all looked at each other. “He never stops fighting.”

Mrs Jones instructs the doctor to have Alex placed into their most secure room and to increase hospital security. “One of the people who did this to him is still out there, and she has a grudge against Alex. She may try to get to him. We’re sending over our own people as well.” she tells the doctor, looking at Wolf and his team, who all nod. Wolf and Snake stand and leave with Mrs Jones for the hospital as Fox and Eagle head home to be ready to take over their watch the next day. Alan Blunt takes Smithers aside and speaks quietly to him for a moment, before telling Crawley to come with him to help get the search going for Stellenbosch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to have Mrs Jones shoot the clone rather than Yassen because reasons.   
> Also, it's left unclear whether the clone is dead or alive to tie in with later books. If you've read them you'll understand. If you haven't, go read them!


	7. The Hospital

Alex lies sleeping in a hospital bed somewhere in London. A ventilator whispers quietly as it pumps oxygen into the tube attached below his nose, and an ECG monitor beeps softly as his heart beats steadily. Despite his height, he looks small there in the bed, pale and much younger than he actually is. 

Sitting slumped onto the side of the bed where she’s stayed since he came out of surgery, Jack is lightly touching Alex’s fingertips with her own, one of the few places he’s not bruised or bandaged. Across the room, Tom sleeps on a couch in the boneless style of teenagers everywhere. His broken arm has been set and his parents called but he’s so far refused to go home. 

Mrs Jones and Wolf walk quietly down the hallway towards Alex’s room and pause in the doorway. Snake has taken up her station at the entry to the ward, and Alex has been given a room at the end of the hall with no other access into it, not even a window. They stare in dismay at Alex.  
Almost every part of his body is either vividly bruised, patched or bandaged, with his right forearm in a cast. He has uncovered stitches on his temple, his cheek below a black eye and on several cuts across his torso and arms where he’s not covered in bandages. His neck has been left unbandaged and the many ligature marks are clearly visible, including a spectacularly vivid one that wasn’t in the video they’d just seen. Below the cast on his arm, his right wrist is bandaged, as is his left wrist, though that one extends up into an enormous bandage on his left hand and thumb. Even his knuckles on both hands are bruised from when he fought the clone at the school. About the only areas not marked by his ordeal are a small patch on his right shoulder, and his fingertips. 

Alex’s breathing quickens and his eyes start to flutter as his fingers twitch, waking Jack. She calls his name softly and his eyes slowly open, looking up and then at her in confusion.  
“It’s ok Alex, you’re in the hospital.” Jack tells him. He blinks at her and looks around, moving his neck carefully, seeing Mrs Jones and Wolf at the door as he turns his head. Seeing Tom asleep on the couch, Alex sighs and relaxes, closing his eyes again in relief. His friend was safe. Jack calls softly to Tom, waking him. Seeing Alex awake, Tom comes closer, grinning at him in happiness. 

“G’day mate.” Tom reaches out to touch Alex then thinks better of it, not wanting to hurt him. “Looks like we’ve got matching casts ay!” showing him his own arm. “That was some crazy mojo you had going on there. You alright?”  
Alex nods weakly, not actually knowing if he was alright or not, but he wasn’t feeling any pain. He guessed they had him doped up on something, and looking over towards Jack, noticed an IV bag hanging next to the bed. He cleared his throat and licked his dry lips, looking at Jack who realised he was thirsty.  
“The doctor said you can only have small sips to start with.” she tells him as she holds a cup and straw to his mouth. “The IV will replace the fluids you need until you can drink more.”  
Alex nodded again and dropped his head back onto the pillow, closing his eyes in exhaustion.

“I have to take Tom home Alex. The nurses have been trying to kick us out for ages, but I’ll come back first thing in the morning. They can try and stop me.” Jack tells him, touching him lightly on his shoulder. “Get lots of rest. We’ll see you tomorrow.” as she and Tom leave the room. 

Mrs Jones and Wolf come further into the room and stand on each side of Alex’s bed, looking down at him. He opens his eyes and looks at them quietly, waiting to hear what they have to say.  
“Alex, we are so sorry. We had no idea there was a clone of you, or that Stellenbosch was alive.” Mrs Jones starts. Alex blinks and looks away, not knowing what to say. He hadn’t realised either so he couldn’t really blame them. He’d seen the Level 2 room made to match his room at Point Blanc, and still hadn’t figured it out. Suddenly he realises something and looks quickly back at Mrs Jones, from her to Wolf and back again.  
“She’s still alive, isn’t she?” he asks hoarsely in dread. “Stellenbosch is still out there.”  
Wolf nods. “That’s why I’m here, and Snake is down the hall. We won’t leave you alone until they find her.”

Mrs Jones hurries to reassure him as well. “We’ve increased security at the hospital and you’re in the most secure room. We’ve also got protective details on Jack and Tom. The agency are working with the police and Interpol and searching for her everywhere. Alex, do you know where they kept you? It’s possible she’s gone back there.”  
Alex closes his eyes again as he remembers freeing himself. The anguish he’d felt as he ripped his wrist through the cable-ties, the incredible pain it caused as it cut through his hand. Even once he’d pulled his hand through it wasn’t over, the slipknot around his neck had tightened when he fell to the floor and he’d nearly strangled himself before he was able to loosen it.  
“I was next door,” he tells them. “I was next door to my home the whole time. In the basement of my neighbours’ house. I think they killed them.” he added sadly, though he hadn’t seen anyone as he'd escaped from the house and run desperately to the school.  
“Hmm.” Mrs Jones replies. “I suppose that made it easy for the clone to go back and forth from you to Jack. Leave it with me, we’ll check it out. Get some rest Alex, I’ll be back to see you tomorrow. Wolf will stay with you tonight.”

Once Mrs Jones had left, Alex closed his eyes again. It was after 1am by now, and he was utterly exhausted. He flickered his eyes open to see Wolf settling quietly into a chair near the door, then he drifted off to sleep. Alex didn’t stir when, a short time later, two nurses came into the room. They checked his IV, injected more medicine into the line, and added a few more teddy bears and vases of flowers to the ones already on the side of the room, watched carefully by Wolf. They then took a warmed blanket from their cart and placed it carefully over Alex’s upper torso, gently making sure his arms were covered as well. 

“He can’t wear a gown with all those injuries,” one of the nurses told Wolf, “so we’ll keep him warm with blankets. Poor thing looks right done in, doesn’t he.” The other adds sympathetically as they leave. Wolf looks over at Alex and shakes his head sorrowfully, sighing to himself as he resumes his protective watch over him. 

An hour or so later, Wolf notices that Alex’s heart rate is increasing on the monitor. His eyes start fluttering under his lids and he starts thrashing his arms around. Alex’s movements get increasingly more agitated as he fights to get the blanket off his arms and chest, crying out “No, stop, please stop!” at the nightmarish memory of a sadistic Stellenbosch, looming over him with a syringe in her hand, smiling wickedly as she leans down to inject him. Alex fights the restraints holding him down, trying desperately to free himself, to do anything to stop it from happening yet again.  
Wolf moves to his side and tries to shake Alex awake, quickly realising that the only place he can touch Alex that is unhurt is his shoulder. He touches Alex carefully and calls his name as an alarm goes off on the heart monitor, summoning the nurse. 

Alex’s eyes fly open and he looks at Wolf in sheer terror, not knowing where he is or who with. Wolf’s heart breaks a little at the fear in Alex’s eyes, feeling for this boy lying in panic in front of him, gasping and shaking from the strength of the nightmare he’s just woken from. 

A nurse bustles into the room holding a syringe, heading for the IV line. “No!” cries Alex, “Please don’t!”  
“You need it darling, we can’t have your heart rate this high, it’s bad for your heart after all those shocks you had.” she replies, as she injects it into the line.  
“No! I can do it myself, I don’t want to be drugged again!” Alex shouts desperately, looking at Wolf who doesn’t know what to do. Alex looks at the IV line and follows it with his eyes, realising it leads to his neck. He reaches up with his right arm and scrabbles at it, before grabbing it and pulling the whole thing out of his neck, throwing it defiantly onto the floor as fresh blood trickles down his chest. 

“I won’t be sedated while she’s still out there!” he declares to Wolf, glaring at the nurse who clucks her tongue at him. Alex ignores her and closes his eyes, beginning the deep breathing mediation his uncle taught him years ago, bringing his heart rate under control. Wolf and the nurse both stare in amazement as the monitor shows his heart rate slowing down as he calms himself. The nurse leaves the room muttering to herself, telling Wolf that Alex will be in pain soon without the medicine that’s been numbing it for him until now. Wolf stares at Alex as he gets his heart rate down, then opens his eyes and looks back at Wolf.  
“Sorry about that.” Alex apologises, and Wolf exhales in surprise.  
“What are you apologising to me for Cub?” he asks.  
“For being rude.” Alex replies. “You were only trying to help, I didn’t mean to yell at you. I just can’t be drugged again, not while Stellenbosch is still out there. You don’t understand, she’s insane. The things she said to me, and did to me…” he pauses, and shudders. “I just can’t be helpless again.”  
“I think I understand.” Wolf tells Alex, not mentioning the videos of Alex being tortured that he’d seen. “Do you think you can get back to sleep?” Alex shakes his head. “No, not for a while.” Wolf brings out a pack of cards and raises his eyebrows at Alex. “Want to play?” 

Early the next day, Jack and Mrs Jones both come to visit Alex, before they have to go to work. They walk down the corridor together and stop in the doorway to Alex’s room.  
Jack catches her breath as she sees Alex sleeping peacefully, tucked under a large black jacket. She looks at Wolf questioningly, who shrugs bashfully.  
“The weight of the blanket gives him nightmares,” he tells her. “but when he finally fell asleep, he got cold, so I put my jacket over him. He seems to be able to tolerate it better than the blanket.”

“Ian used to do the same thing when Alex was younger.” Jack said quietly. “His jacket was very similar to yours.” She murmured a thank you and stepped past him into the room. Mrs Jones said nothing but raises her eyebrows at Wolf in speculation, looking from Alex under the jacket, to the cards on the table, to Wolf. 

“How was his night?” she asked. “Terrible.” Wolf replied. “He’s only been asleep now for about an hour.” He continued telling Mrs Jones about Alex refusing all medication and the pain he was starting to feel before he finally fell asleep a short while ago. Jack came and listened to him and said she didn’t have the heart to wake him after such a bad night.  
“Will you let him know I came, and that I’ll be back after work this afternoon?” she asked Wolf. “I’d stay, but I only got this job last week and I need it to be able to support Alex now.”  
“Of course,” Wolf tells her, “if he’s still asleep when Fox gets here, I’ll ask him to tell Alex.”  
Jack leaves, while Mrs Jones talks to Wolf about what was found in the house that Alex had been kept in. “No sign of Stellenbosch there though. We’re still searching.”  
Wolf looks at her. “He’s completely terrified of her you know.” he says softly.  
“I’m not surprised,” she answers, as she turns to leave, “wouldn’t you be after what she put him through?”

Through the day Alex struggles to manage the pain he increasingly feels. Dark shadows appear under his eyes, his face turns pinched and taut, a clammy sweat on his brow. He endures the visits by the doctor and nurses and dressing changes as quietly as he can, gasping now and then as they prod a particularly painful spot. When they lecture him yet again about taking the medication, he glares silently at them and refuses to speak. Fox stands quietly in the background, watching everything and missing nothing. He is impressed by Alex’s stoicism and hopes that Stellenbosch is caught soon, so the boy can feel safe and rest. 

In the afternoon, Tom appears and the room immediately feels brighter to Alex.  
“Sorry it took so long to get here old mate.” Tom tells him. “Only my parents are feeling a bit protective of me after yesterday and didn’t want to let me out. I had to wait until my brother distracted them and sneak out.” He pulls out his laptop and sets it up on the table over Alex’s bed and grins. “So, now that you can’t get out of it, shall we watch some Samurai in action? I knew something was up the other day when you said you wanted to watch a Samurai movie, you’ve never said that before. I just never thought it was a clone of you, I mean, who even does that? Makes clones of people! It’s bonkers is what it is.”  
Alex smiles a little and nods. Good old Tom. He can always be relied on to keep things down to earth, and normal.  
Halfway through the movie, Tom glances at Alex and realises that he’s fallen asleep, and smiled to himself a little, but sadly. Alex had found a way to get out of watching a Samurai movie yet again. Tom had seen Alex shifting uncomfortably around and knew he was feeling a lot of pain. Even now, while he’s asleep, his eyes are still pinched in pain and he’s breathing shallowly. It’s clearly not a deep, healing nap that he’s having. Tom keeps the movie going, not wanting any sudden silence to wake Alex, and waits for his friend to wake up again. 

A short time later, Alex gasps himself awake from yet another nightmare and hisses with pain as it all comes crashing back down on him.  
“Alex, can’t you let them give you some sort of pain relief? You’re not Wolverine mate, you’re only human.” Tom asks from beside his bed.  
“I can’t.” Alex replies weakly. “I just, can’t. She’s still out there.” Tom purses his lips together in worry. He only knows the barest details of what’s happened to Alex, but he knows his friend is in pain and shouldn’t be.  
“I’ve got some paracetamol in my bag, can you have that at least?” he asks desperately. Alex thinks about it for a moment. “Sure Tom, I can do that.” 

As they are finishing the movie, Jack arrives with pizzas for them all, including Fox. The paracetamol has helped to dull the pain slightly and Alex is able to sit up and eat a piece, suddenly realising that he hasn’t eaten decent anything in days and days. The nurses had brought in sandwiches for lunch but they hadn’t even touched the edges of his hunger.  
“No anchovies Alex. I won’t ever fall for that again.” Jack smiles sadly. “You know, next time a clone tries to impersonate you.”  
She tells him about her new job at the law firm for a while, then looks at him. “You know you can tell me about what happened, right? You don’t have to keep it to yourself.”  
“I know.” Alex tells her. “I’m just not ready to talk about it yet.” Jack nods in understanding, then it’s time for her and Tom to leave.  
Jack smiles at Wolf as she leaves, who is arriving to change watch with Fox. They speak quietly together in the hall, Fox telling Wolf about Alex’s day, and how the pain is getting worse. Alex has barely slept throughout the day, only managing short naps before the pain or the nightmares wake him. Everyone is starting to be very worried about him. 

Mrs Jones comes back after dinner to report that there’s no progress in finding Stellenbosch yet. Trying to hide her concern at Alex’s evident pain and exhaustion, she discusses the lack of leads regarding Ian’s death since Greif was murdered. The trauma that Alex has been through, and the suffering he’s silently enduring now, have aged his features prematurely, making his resemblance to his father even more striking.  
“Did you see anyone else at the school Alex? Anyone at all?” she asks him. Alex thinks for a moment, then tells her about the man with the scar. Mrs Jones stares at him with a troubled look on her face, then shows him a picture on her iPad and asks “Is that him?” “Yes, though he’s a lot younger there.” Alex tells her. “Who is he?”  
“His name is Yassen Gregorovich.” She replies. “We thought he was dead.”  
Jones doesn’t tell Alex that Yassen used to work with John Rider. He still doesn’t know about his Father and she isn’t ready to tell him. “Leave it with me.” She tells him as she stands to leave. “Try and rest Alex, your body needs it to heal. I’ll see you tomorrow.” After she leaves, Wolf comes in and sits with Alex again.  
“Go to sleep Cub, I’ll be watching out for you.” Alex smiles quietly at him and tries to get comfortable, eventually drifting off. 

A few hours later, Alex jerks awake again as he has yet another nightmare. Wolf is touching his shoulder and looking at him reassuringly. Alex sighs and rests his head back on the pillow. The pain seems to be radiating from every part of his body and he is feeling deeply fatigued. He wishes they would find Stellenbosch. Opening his eyes he looks around the room and notices a brightly coloured bunch of floating balloons over to the side, held down by a wrapped weight.  
“Where did that come from?” he asked Wolf.  
“A nurse brought it in not long ago, said it was from Tom. Do you want to see the card?” Wolf replies, standing and going over to the balloons.  
“Yes please.” Alex replies, reaching out for the envelope that Wolf hands him, and opens it clumsily with his bandaged hands. Wolf crosses the room and sits down again, then notices that Alex has gone completely still. “Alex?” he asks. “Are you alright?”

Alex’s hands start shaking and he blinks rapidly, his face suddenly even paler than before. He looks up at Wolf, his eyes seeming huge, bright, and somehow vulnerable from the tears Wolf can see shimmering in them. He looks at what he is holding again, then hands a photo from inside the card to Wolf and continues to stare at the inside of the card with a furrowed brow. Wolf looks down to see a photo of Eva Stellenbosch, suspended by her wrists from a chain in exactly the same position that Alex had been held in, with three bullet holes across her torso and a fourth in the centre of her forehead, her dead eyes staring at the camera. He looks quickly at Alex, who is looking back at him with a strange expression on his face. Shocked, horrified, but also relieved.  
He hands the card to Wolf, who reads the short note written inside in a loose scrawl.  
“Rest easy Alex. Y.G.”

Wolf tells Alex that he has to report this, and Alex nods, reaching for the call button as Wolf steps out of the room. Wolf photographs the photo and the note and sends them to Mrs Jones, texting her to call him. She rings immediately, and while Wolf is on the phone to her, the nurses arrive and he hears Alex telling them that they can put the central line back in and start the medication again. The nurses are so happy that he’s finally accepting their help that they rush off to get it organised, and are back very quickly. Wolf is still on the phone call, which now includes Blunt and Smithers as well as Jones, when Alex drifts off to sleep, the pain medication and sedatives both working quickly on his exhausted mind and body. 

\-------------------------------------

Midnight comes and goes, and Alex is still asleep. He hasn’t had any nightmares and has turned onto his left side, the arm with the line in it flung out in front of him and his right hand tucked under his cheek. His sleeping face is smooth and untroubled, innocent of any pain or suffering, the lines of anxiety eased away at last. It makes him look terribly young. With a light cotton sheet draped around his hips, his bare torso rises and falls gently with his soft, even breaths, as he sleeps a deep sleep of healing. 

Mrs Jones and Smithers arrive quietly and Wolf steps out into the corridor to speak with them.  
“We found her in the basement where Alex had been held.” Mrs Jones tells him. “She’s been shot at close range in exactly the same places as Alex was, except for her head.”  
“Point blank range?” Wolf asks strangely. “Yes, exactly.” she replies in understanding. 

“What we don’t know,” Smithers says, “is how Yassen Gregorovich knew. How did he know that Alex has been injured, and in what way, and how did he know that Alex has been having nightmares about Stellen-bitch? I think this room has been bugged.” 

The other two stare at him, bemused by his name for Stellenbosch, as he turns and enters Alex’s room, taking a device out of his bag as he went. He waves the device around the walls, then turns towards Alex, stopping to stare at his back. Going back to the door, he points back at Alex.  
“The bitch really left her mark on him, didn’t she. I knew she was burning him but that’s a whole other level of sadism. ” Smithers growled, as Wolf and Jones look at the usually mild mannered man in surprise before going to look at Alex’s back.  
Mrs Jones exhales sharply as she sees, burnt by the many repeated cigarette burns, a capitol S on Alex’s right shoulder blade. She takes out her Iphone and snaps a picture, sending it to Alan Blunt. “Does Alex know?” she asks Wolf in worry, as they step back into the corridor.  
“I don’t think he does,” Wolf answers, “how could he?”  
“We need to get that fixed before he realises how she marked him” Jones tells him. “The question is, is it an S for Stellenbosch, or an S for Scorpia?”  
“Could be either,” Wolf answers.  
“Blunt thinks Yassen is grooming Alex. That he wants him for Scorpia. ” Mrs Jones tells him worriedly. Wolf just shrugs. “Alex isn’t stupid,” he tells her. “he knows who the good guys are.”  
“Does he though?” Mrs Jones asked. “He hasn’t exactly had many reasons to trust us.”

Smithers finishes his sweep and comes out of the room, stuffing a teddy bear into his bag. “This bear has something very like a nanny-cam in its eyes, only much more sophisticated. It would have been able to see the whole room, and hear everything too.” he tells them. “I’ve deactivated it and will take it back to my lab to examine it. Do you know when it arrived?” he asks Wolf. Wolf looks worried, and says “It was here the first night, before I arrived.”

“Dammit.” Mrs Jones swears. “How did he know so fast?” She sighs, and turns to look at Alex. “At least he’s resting better now. I wish he’d trusted us enough to allow the medication sooner.”  
“Well, he’s not wrong, is he.” mutters Smithers to himself, looking around guiltily as both Wolf and Mrs Jones turn and stare at him.  
“What. Do. You. Mean.” Wolf growls at him menacingly. Smithers looks from side to side and sighs, shrugging.  
“It was Blunt’s idea of course. He had me bring over all the vials of that healing cocktail that we found at Point Blanc. They managed to give Alex two doses of it on the first night before he removed the central line. I imagine they’ve given him one or two more doses tonight as well, since he’s allowed it to be put back in. Blunt didn’t want him to be in pain any longer than he has to be. He ordered me not to say anything.”  
“Yeah right,” Wolf rumbled, “I’m sure that’s not the only reason he did this. He always has another plan in mind.”  
“Alex should heal much faster, and with very few scars at least.” Smithers says hopefully.  
Mrs Jones just sighs and shakes her head at Smithers before turning to leave. Wolf stays behind, covering Alex again with his jacket. Alex continues to sleep peacefully on, entirely unaware of their conversation or of the bug that has been found, as Wolf watches over him protectively. 

In a darkened room elsewhere in London, Yassen Gregorovich shuts down his laptop, no longer able to watch over Alex now that his bug has been discovered. He is not concerned about it, knowing that he and Alex will meet again, sooner or later. His final image of Alex, resting peacefully on his side facing the camera, nightmare free, was enough for him – for now.


	8. After

A few weeks later, the doorbell of number 42 rings early in the morning. Jack answers the door to see Wolf standing there, dressed in jogging gear.  
“Good morning.” she says to him, smiling, and he smiles back.  
“Is Alex ready?” Wolf asks, as Alex comes down the stairs, also wearing exercise clothes. Tom appears behind him, having stayed over for the night, but makes no effort to go with them, stating that it’s far too early for sensible people to be out getting sweaty. 

The two leave together, jogging slowly down the street as they warm up before their new morning routine of jogging followed by a variety of other training, something different every day.  
Alex had been released from hospital a week ago and Wolf had been at his door early every morning since. 

They were taking it easy, as even with the fast healing caused by the cocktail (that Alex was still unaware of), he still had several injuries not yet fully healed. He’d had a couple of surgeries since then as well, one to remove the S mark on his shoulder that they also hadn’t told him about. It could still be seen very faintly, but only if you were looking for it. 

Alex had recently started talking to Jack, Tom and Wolf about what Stellenbosch and the clone had done to him. It was difficult for him to talk about and those talks were often full of stops and starts, with Alex gazing off into the distance, or shuddering to a stop mid-sentence. The therapist provided by MI6 was helping him work through it all slowly, and it was getting a little easier each time. The holiday break was ending soon and he was looking forward to getting back to school, though he had no idea how to explain the events at the dance. Luckily no-one else had actually seen the clone and him together, so it just seemed like he’d been fighting someone again. 

“How’re you doing Alex?” Wolf asks him.  
“I’m alright thanks Wolf.” Alex Rider answers softly, smiling up at his large new friend, as the sun breaks through the clouds above and illuminates his clear blue eyes. “I’m alright.”

And he was.

The End, for now…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well that's it, my thoughts on how the tv show should have ended.  
> I hope you enjoyed it, it's my first ever fan fic.  
> Bring on season 2!


End file.
